"That's a good thing. I said to the team before the game that some teams are done. Some teams are as good, or as bad, as they're going to be at this point of the season. We're not. We're in need of practice and improving."
The win was the fifth in the last seven games for the Hawks (17-10, 7-5 A-10) and kept them in contention for a first-round bye in next month's conference tournament.
Carl Jones paced the Hawks with 28 points and dished six assists.
C.J. Aiken (18 points) and Langston Galloway (16) rounded out a trio of double-figure scorers.
Orion Outerbridge's 19 points led the Rams (5-22, 2-10), who are in danger of failing to qualify for the conference tournament.
St. Joe's built a 28-20 lead with 6:19 left in the first half, but URI gradually chipped away at the deficit and went into the break leading, 38-36.
"[Martelli] came into the locker room real mad," Jones said. "We understood why he was mad because we came out kind of sluggish. We really felt we had to pick it up in the second half and that's what we did in the beginning of it."
The Hawks hit URI with a 14-0 run to forge a 57-43 lead. But URI countered with a 14-3 run that was fueled by five St. Joe's turnovers and sliced the Rams' deficit to 60-57.
St. Joe's turnovers were a direct result of URI's fullcourt pressure.
"We didn't have great spacing and we didn't have great decision-making against the pressure," Martelli said. "We're encouraging teams to press us by the way that we're kind of passive.
"We're not as quick as I would like, so that's on me."
The Hawks definitely were "quick" going down the stretch when they soared on a 12-0 run that was keyed by a Galloway trey.
Jones ensured URI wouldn't rally by feeding Aiken for a basket on a fastbreak, scoring himself on a break, and twice sinking both ends of a two-shot foul.
"The runs were a matter of our playing our game instead of playing halfcourt and not getting stuck in how they play," Jones said. "We had to play how we play."
But even Jones admitted that the Hawks could have done a better job of handling URI's press.
"We definitely have a lot of room for improvement in terms of [reducing] our turnovers and handling the press," Jones said. "That's what we really have to work on in practice."
